Chapter 520: Out-of-control Reaper
A’Ji was puzzled and asked, “Since this Corpse-eating Dog Du Ming died in the wild, how could he appear in Leprosy Village three years later? Uncle, did you mistake him for someone else?”
“No way.” Meng Chao shook his head slowly. “Even if I mistook him for someone else and he isn’t Corpse-eating Dog Du Ming, there’s no mistaking his tattoo and scars. He’s definitely a member of the Reaper Squad.
“Look, aside from the laser barcode at the back of his neck, he also has a small circle on his neck that is slightly different in color from the skin around it.
“This is a sign that he wore a spirit energy magnetic field collar for a long time. But just now, when I beheaded him, the upturned flesh and blood that gushed out covered this part.
“Look here too. This is the most indisputable evidence I found.”
Meng Chao lifted the corpse’s left arm and revealed the armpit.
Meng Chao held a harvesting blade between his fingers and pointed at the corpse’s armpit. “Do you see that? There’s a small wound over here.”
A’Ji widened his eyes and stared for a long time before he nodded and said, “I see it. It’s a wound the size of a grain. What is it?”
“It’s a mark left by minimally invasive surgery. The members of the Reaper Squad receive surgery where a tunnel is opened on their left armpits, and a mini crystal bomb is implanted near their hearts. This is the only way for the government to be in control of their lives and deaths, and it’s how they receive the right to continue living.”
As Meng Chao spoke, he gently cut open a wound in the corpse’s armpit.
His movements were gentle, accurate, and stable as he tried to not damage the proliferative tissue. He delved deep into the wound by peeling off the layers. Soon, he dissected the area until he reached the heart.
And just as he expected, he saw a few stents around the heart. They had now become one with the heart.
But the mini crystal bomb that should have been fixed to the stents was gone.
“He has a laser barcode on his nape, a mark that he once wore a spirit energy magnetic field collar on his neck, and stents in his heart. If one piece of evidence may just be a coincidence, then when three pieces of evidence are piled up together, can it still be a coincidence?”
Meng Chao narrowed his eyes and gritted his teeth. “Someone helped this guy remove the mini crystal bomb bound at his heart, and he regained his freedom!”
A’Ji’s eyes were wide from shock.
“Trust me. The government is always very careful when it uses the fearsome Reaper Squad. They are only allowed to carry out suicidal missions in the wild, and it’s the same as an exile. They are never allowed to carry out missions in the city,” Meng Chao said. “This person is definitely not one of us!”
“But...” A’Ji scratched his head. “I don’t get it. He’s someone who should have died three years ago. How did he resurrect from the dead and remove his spirit energy magnetic field collar and bomb?”
“Let me think about it. I don’t recall the government ever finding all the corpses from that Reaper Squad.
“The Apocalyptic Beast had already trampled some and eaten others, so it was a dream to want their corpses to remain unmangled. I think the government only managed to find some severed limbs, mangled organs, lots of blood, and crushed bones. They had also used the long-distance monitoring system to watch the members of Reaper Squad, and all of their physiological parameters had been reduced to zero, which was why they were announced to be dead.
“Now that I think about it, as long as you were great at hacking, you could hack the monitoring system of the Reaper Squad and change their physiological parameters.
“And even after you lose a lot of bones and flesh, it doesn’t mean that you will necessarily die. Superhumans have great vitality. Even if they lose a few organs, as long as they have time, someone with great medical skills treating them, and a lot of cultivation resources, they can regrow those organs.
“Perhaps most of the people from the Reaper Squad died without a grave in that battle, but a handful of people were only heavily injured and were... captured by something in the fog!”
When Meng Chao said this, he shuddered.
He suddenly realized that the Reaper Squad System set up by the government had a fatal loophole.
The members of the Reaper Squad were all wild and brutal lunatics, madmen, criminals, and even demons who had already long ago forgotten the ideals of society.
If there were only monsters with no intelligence in the wild, then using the Reaper Squad to fight against them until they were both heavily injured was indeed the best way to use them as resources.
Even if the members of the Reaper Squad could temporarily break free from the government’s control, the mini crystal bomb implanted into their neck arteries, cervical spines, central nervous systems, and hearts would start counting down and blast them into pieces, while their heads would also be blown off.
It has to be known that even fearsome Apocalyptic Beasts like the Crystalline Nine-headed Dragons did not have the intelligence, skills, and facilities to remove the mini crystal bombs from the members of the Reaper Squad.
This was why the government was at ease when they “exiled” the Reaper Squads.
But now, the monsters were no longer monsters with only brawns and no brains.
Instead, they had been enlightened, had technology in their hands, and even used the strength of humans to create their own civilization.
Based on the fact that the monster civilization had created the White Spirit and the other Supernatural Ent.i.ties, the enemy was already in control of rather good biochemical modification techniques and surgical abilities.
It was not a problem for them to remove the restraints from the Reaper Squad.
Then, was Corpse-eating Dog Du Ming the only Reaper Squad member that the monster civilization had captured and “freed”?
There were more than one thousand Reaper Squad members who had died in the past decade. It was common for no one to be able to find the corpses of the dead in the fog, so no one ever suspected their deaths.
Yet the “dead” Reaper Squad members had actually gone missing. Just how many of them were retrieved like Corpse-eating Dog Du Ming and taken in by the monster civilization, where they were brainwashed to the point that they became the most loyal claws of the monster civilization? And how many of them snuck into Dragon City in the disguise of humans?
Meng Chao could not help but cuss.
He had thought that the only enemies he had to face were the Vortex and a group of lost people who had bounties on their heads.
They might be powerful, but as long as he had the chance to tell the truth and reveal the enemy’s scheme, then receive support from the powerful people in Leprosy Village and Golden Tooth Lair, such as Dragon City’s Underground Emperor, maintaining the order in the lair would not be an impossible task.
After all, the difference between humans and monsters was too great. No matter how great the Vortex was, it would not dare to reveal its true face in public.
But now, the enemy side did not just consist of the Vortex and the lost people. There were also an unknown number of former Reaper Squad members.
These people had committed heinous crimes and fought at the borders of h.e.l.l. Some of them had even died once. They were definitely the most terrifying opponents.
Meng Chao’s head started to throb, and it hurt. It felt as if there were ten thousand hornets stabbing him, which was extremely uncomfortable.
“There’s still no signal?” he asked A’Ji.
To prevent themselves from being located, both of them had thrown away most of their communicators. They only retained a rugged phone with a rubber cover.
A’Ji brought out that phone and cast a glance at it. He shook his head. “There’s nothing.”
“Forget it.” Meng Chao gave up on the hope of communicating with the outside world. He took the phone and pulled out the chip to crush it.
Then, he directed the camera at the corpse’s face, the laser barcode on the nape, the clear white skin circle on the neck, and the wound on the armpit from the minimally invasive surgery. He took pictures of them from various angles.
These were all proof.
At a critical moment, they might be of surprising use.
Once he was done, he removed all weapons from Dog-eating Corpse Du Ming’s motorized armor.
Then, he pondered over his choices before he chose a mini gun that was easy to carry and some hand grenades, then stuffed them beneath his waterproof canvas.
As for ridiculously bulky guns like the shoulder rocket launcher, he connected them together to turn them into explosives that would explode upon contact.
Meng Chao stuffed Du Ming’s corpse and motorized armor deep into the trash pile.
Of course, he also stuffed a lot of “mines” made of rocket projectiles underneath as well.
“Let’s go,” Meng Chao told A’Ji. “We have to hurry and find Ms. Mulian before our enemy reaches her and tells her some lies. Then, we’ll have her bring us to the village chief and Wild Wolf so that we can tell them that the ‘captors’ who are wreaking havoc in Leprosy Village are all fake. They’re not sent by the government but are fakes formed by lost people and former Reaper Squad members!”
Before his voice could fade away, thunderous roars came from the streets again.
It seemed like there were countless people running in anger.
Meng Chao and A’Ji exchanged a glance. They could see the puzzlement in each other’s eyes.
“Let’s go take a look.”
While sticking close to the walls, they took a few turns and approached the main street from the shadows.
They saw thousands of Leprosy Village villagers gathering into a roaring wave. All of them were gnashing their teeth in exasperation and fury.
Quite a number of people had tears spilling out of their eyes, which were as hot and fiery as magma.
“Revenge!” someone shouted loudly in the crowd.
“We have to take revenge for the village chief!
“These people are b.a.s.t.a.r.ds! They don’t treat our lives as anything important!
“Capturing wanted criminals? They’re one hundred times more brutal than the wanted criminals!
“We have to hurry and find Wild Wolf! The village chief is dead. Right now, only Wild Wolf can protect us and Leprosy Village!”
“The village chief is dead?”
Meng Chao felt as if someone had hit him over the head, and he saw stars.
But when he thought about it carefully, he did not find it strange.
Since the village chief could get Leprosy Village an endless supply of synthetic food cans and clean, drinkable water, it meant that he had been in constant contact with the outside world. He might even be able to contact the nine great mega corporations, the Supernatural Tower, and the Survival Committee through Saber Jin Wanhao.
Hence, the outside world had always tacitly allowed Leprosy Village to continue existing.
As long as the village chief remained alive, Leprosy Village would not descend into chaos. At the very least, the village chief would not mindlessly believe that the super crystal bomb explosion that happened earlier was due to the captors from outside.
He might even be suspicions of the fake “captors”.
Getting rid of the village chief was a necessary step for the Vortex’s scheme.
Meng Chao whispered to A’Ji, “Go and ask for information about how the village chief died, what the villagers are currently doing, and whether Ms. Mulian is still in her hospital.
“If my guess is correct, the next to die is Ms. Mulian.”